Tsundzukani Daycare Center - New Classroom Project - South Africa - August 2022

​The New Classroom project at the Tsundzukani Daycare Center is now successfully complete. Ms. Nyango and staff are delighted with their new building and can't wait to have it soon filled with approximately 30 students to attend their classes. This is a great project for the Mashangaan and Bapedi community of Acornoek and the village's elders are very pleased with the development taking place at the Daycare Center where a lot of their children attend their first years of school.

The technical implementation was carried out successfully once more by the Vulavula Construction team as it went smoothly and on schedule despite the out-of-season rain falls this year, which interrupted our work several times. We also brought in two local friends for assisting the construction team with basic labor such as digging foundations, moving of building materials, etc. This is also part of our on-the-job training program through which we offer an opportunity to these local potential artisans to advance their building skills and earn much needed cash. These Mashangaan and Bapedi youngsters, men and women, are starved of opportunities and therefore are highly motivated to work hard and learn more skills. According to the latest official Labor Force Survey in 2022, the unemployment rate is around 32.6 percent. Approximately 55.5 percent (30.3 million people) of the population is living in poverty while a total of 13.8 million people (25 percent) are experiencing food poverty. As of 2021, an individual living in South Africa with less than R 890 Rands per month (roughly) is considered poor. Consumer prices are up 9 percent in June 2022, the largest increase in 40 years and fuel prices rose by 33.2 percent in twelve months.

In conclusion Nyango and all Tsundzukani staff are again very grateful to Plenty Canada and the Canadian donors for the financial and technical assistance provided so far to the Center. Plenty Canada has funded its entire water and sanitation systems, irrigation to its vegetable garden and orchard, the complete upgrade of the Center's kitchen, and now the new classroom. The next important development project of the Center will be the construction of a resource center, and we are currently busy pricing it so that we can provide Plenty Canada with a detailed project proposal.
 
— Mwana Bermudes